by DailyDigest

Economy

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that federal deficits will average $1.2 trillion a year from 2019 to 2028, according to its April economic outlook. Its 2018 deficit estimates rose by $242 billion over previous forecasts made in June 2017. The federal agency said the revision was mainly owing to lower projected revenues tied to tax reform.

The meeting on Monday will be closely scrutinized for signs of whether Mr. Trump is friendlier to his Russian counterpart than he was to the NATO leaders. The encounter began late, and the two leaders met one-on-one for more than two hours before heading into a working lunch with their aides.

I understand that a lot of young people are just having fun with this, but ultimately population control is not something that we ever want to celebrate.

There really are global elitists that consider “human overpopulation” to be a “plague” on the planet that needs to be dealt with. They are truly convinced that climate change is the number one threat that the globe is facing, and they have identified human population growth as the primary driver of climate change.

Nameless New York taxi logs were compared with paparazzi shots at locations around the city to reveal that Bradley Cooper and Jessica Alba were bad tippers. In 2017 German researchers were able to identify people based on their “anonymous” web browsing patterns. This week University College London researchers showed how they could identify an individual Twitter user based on the metadata associated with their tweets, while the fitness tracking app Polar revealed the homes and in some cases names of soldiers and spies.

At a time when Europeans and the Japanese began out-producing the U.S. in energy-efficient automobiles and some other advanced technologies, Carter said that Americans had lost faith in being the world’s leader in “progress.” He claimed that Americans obsession with self-indulgence and material goods had trumped spiritualism and community values. Carter, who after the presidency would teach Sunday School, tried to rally the public to have faith in the future of America. After restoring faith in itself, the nation would be able to march on to the “the battlefield of energy [where] we can win for our nation a new confidence, and we can seize control again of our common destiny.”

However, we continue to be concerned about the executive order’s replacement for family separation – family detention. Simply stated, we do not believe that across-the-board family detention is the solution to family separation. Most families do not pose a threat to the community at large and, accordingly, our juvenile detention system is designed around keeping the family together. Given the risks to children’s physical and emotional development posed by prolonged detention, we urge policy makers to consider alternatives.

“Alieno Arcanum is an all-electric hypercar from the future with a brutal technical superiority, which is in the basis of the DNA of the brand Alieno,” explains Ahmed Merchev, founder, CEO and CTO, and chief constructor of the brand. “This our first debut model, expresses clearly the mission of Alieno to create hypercars with alien technologies from the future into the present. Alieno Arcanum does not follow the rules, but it creates new ones, providing an extremely exciting driving experience and enjoyment.”

Climate models agree that “this really big increase in wet events is quite likely,” said Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the University of California at Los Angeles and an author of a recent paper on the expected changes. “There’s just so much more moisture in the atmosphere in a warming world.”

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Unbelievable Effectivness Of Anti-Russia Propaganda Machine

I posted on facebook a simple statement that "I favored all efforts to establish a friendly relationship with Russia."
I was met with considerable support from many friends who understand the essential element of a feared and evil enemy to maintain the MIIC budget.
But many other friends considered any contact with Russia to be "treason" and "bowing down" and "giving up our sovereignty." Any contact with Russia was to "let them control our elections" from now on.
Friends explained to me that Putin is evil, devious and not to be trusted. They emphasize that he was in the KGB (which is right next to "friend of Adolf Hitler" as a negative character indicator).
They explained that Trump is his puppet and that Putin controls Trump.
I asked for the source of their impressions about Putin's character, and they provided links to:

The New York Times, the Heritage Foundation, NPR, and The Economist.

The possibility that these "trusted and reputable" media outlets could be delivering a coordinated deception was unthinkable. They provide abundant evidence of the evilness of Russia and can be quoted media sources as factual sources substantiating this impression.
Quoting David Collum: "Mario, you brick. It is because nuclear war sucks."

sand_puppy wrote:I posted

sand_puppy wrote:

I posted on facebook a simple statement that "I favored all efforts to establish a friendly relationship with Russia."
I was met with considerable support from many friends who understand the essential element of a feared and evil enemy to maintain the MIIC budget.
But many other friends considered any contact with Russia to be "treason" and "bowing down" and "giving up our sovereignty." Any contact with Russia was to "let them control our elections" from now on.
Friends explained to me that Putin is evil, devious and not to be trusted. They emphasize that he was in the KGB (which is right next to "friend of Adolf Hitler" as a negative character indicator).
They explained that Trump is his puppet and that Putin controls Trump.
I asked for the source of their impressions about Putin's character, and they provided links to:

The New York Times, the Heritage Foundation, NPR, and The Economist.

The possibility that these "trusted and reputable" media outlets could be delivering a coordinated deception was unthinkable. They provide abundant evidence of the evilness of Russia and can be quoted media sources as factual sources substantiating this impression.
Quoting David Collum: "Mario, you brick. It is because nuclear war sucks."

Well, I do agree with your friends' assessment of Putin. I know of no reason to think otherwise. Do you? Although they cited four different publications with quite different philosophical outlooks, your post does not cite specific articles for specific Putin characteristics. Did they? That might be too much like evidence.
Given the publications' different philosophies, it would be quite a feat for all of them to come out with very similar findings in a coordinated fashion. In fact, as an outside observer, I would be likely to conclude that perhaps they all simutaneously committed journalism on the same stories at about the same time. But I guess that would just be too whacky if ZH, FoxNews, Breitbart and Alex Jones all came up with different interpretations. Who ya gonna believe?

Who ya gonna believe?

Good question.
I read the MSM alleging that "Putin done it," and I read the non-MSM media asking to see some evidence. Ron Paul makes the same request. (He seems to have a good reputation in the US. In my part of the cosmos he is little known.)
I read that the Russians have meddled in some number of non-Russian elections. I read that the US has meddled in hundreds, including Australia's.
Who am I going to believe? No idea. I keep everyone at arm's length. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. When new facts emerge, I will change my opinions.

Putin down the Kool Aid

Doug,
I know how much you hate Bad Vlad (all those two minute hates add up!) but how can you possibly justify an escalating confrontational stance with a Nuclear super power and refusing to have a dialog with them? How do reconcile this support for increasing the risk of nuclear war with your environmentalism and social justice?
You are nothing if not a reliable barometer here at PP for the effect and level of brainwashing that the 'coordinated' mainstream media has on the herd, reliably bleating an alarm anytime you see something outside your Overton window of comforting authoritarian consensus. Your ascribing the obviously CIA/Neocon coordinated messaging campaign to "commiting journalisim" is risible.
It would be humorous if your gullibility and malleability wasn't endemic and serves as unfortunate proof of the existential threat to humanity that military/security state represents by virtue of it's historically documented control and influence over these mainstream organs of propaganda and their ability to manufacture consent for war, warfare spending and our panoptical surveillance security state.
mm

Police in New Jersey have officially crossed the [thin blue] line and literally attempted to confiscate guns from an army veteran without a warrant. But it didn’t go as planned, because Leonard Cottrell Jr. refused to comply with the orders of the cops.According to The Daily Wire, two police officers were given orders to go to Cottrell’s home to confiscate his guns. The order followers complied, and “because [Cottrell’s] 13-year-old son had made a comment at school about the Millstone Middle School’s security, and the officers wanted to confiscate Cottrell’s firearms as part of an investigation,”NJ.comreported. But Cottrell disobeyed and defied the orders of the police.
Cottrell legally owns a shotgun and a handgun (not quite a cache of weapons by any stretch of the imagination) but based solely on comments made by his 13-year-old son, police demanded all his guns. According to the report by The Daily Wire, Cottrell says that his wife let the officers into their home and let them search their sons’ room where they did not find any weapons. But the search didn’t end there. The officers then made attempts to try to take his firearms, which “he has all the correct permits to own.”“No one from the state was going to take my firearms without due process,” Cottrell said, according to NJ.com. According to New Jersey law,signed into law Cottrell’s disobedience is “illegal.” Democrat Governor Phil Murphy a bill that makes it incredibly easy for law enforcement to confiscate firearms without due process and for seemingly any reason the state deems.

A couple of thoughts. The police are in a bad position. The oligarchy are able to proceed with their project of centralizing control by making laws, and then telling the police to go out and enforce them. So the police can be put into positions of forcing people to do things that the police don't actually feel are "right."
And the population are in the position of having to refuse the increasing domination efforts of the oligarchy, and possibly fight against the police, who are NOT the source of these laws.
(My daughter just married a very fine and idealistic young man who is a police officer. So I am getting a big dose of the police officer's perspective these days.)

An alternative assessment

The claim made by many neoconservatives that Israel and the United States are partners in the Middle East because their strategic interests are identical is belied by the fact that the Israelis are more than willing to ignore Washington when its suits them to do so. The claim of identical interests has always been false, promoted by the Zionist media and an intensively lobbied Congress to make the lopsided relationship with an essentially racist and apartheid regime more palatable to the American public, but, in wake of the slaughter in Gaza and pending legislation in the Knesset empowering Israeli communities to ban non-Jewish residents, it completely lacks any credibility.
It would probably surprise most American friends of Israel to learn that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has visited Moscow three times so far this year, particularly as Russia has been getting vilified in the U.S. mainstream media on an almost daily basis. There is a reason for the Russophobia beyond what Moscow might or might not have done in the 2016 election. Russia has become a particular target of hostility for the burgeoning number of neoconservative foundations, also closely linked to Israel, whose funding from defense contractors depends on having a powerful enemy. The ability of Israel and its supporters to play both sides regardless of what the accepted perception of what American interests might be should therefore be an issue of some concern.

several thoughts, simultaneously

It turns out, I can have several thoughts in my head, simultaneously.
Thought 1:
Putin is KGB, he was, and always will be. He more or less destroyed Chechnya in the Second Chechen War, and my sense is, he is a fairly ruthless man - which apparently is just what Russia seems to like as a leader. As with anyone who has an intelligence agency background (Clapper, Brennan, Strzok, GHWB, etc), he is not to be trusted. He will pretty much do anything if he thinks he can get away with it.
Thought 2:
We don't have to trust Putin in order to engage in a dialog. Dialog, as the Democrats said back in the 1980s, was better than war with the then-Soviet Union. (Anyone old enough to remember that?) Arguably, the Soviet Union was a much, Much, MUCH larger existential threat to the West than Putin. How many divisions did they have opposing us across the Fulda Gap? A lot. Hundreds. Now we talk about a brigade or two as if that's a consequential force. How times have changed. But - I remember what came before. We weren't always at war with Eastasia. I remember.
Thought 3:
Russians have been meddling in the US since forever. What happened in 2016 is nothing new. Why all the fuss now? Because - assuming he did it - in 2016, Putin won the Intel Op lottery. He found a really critical truth that HRC was desperate to hide: namely, that she had just rigged the primary, with the collusion/cooperation of the US government and/or US intelligence agencies. And then he exposed this truth for everyone to see. There is nothing more deadly than revealing the truth. Nothing.
And Putin did it - assuming he did it - on a shoestring. My guess is, Putin probably got Podesta, and Seth Rich leaked the DNC files.
Counter-Strike
The (Obama-appointed) leadership of those three US intel agencies (CIA, NSA, FBI) were quite upset by the defeat of HRC, as their chance at continued employment within the government were basically zero. They were also exposed - as they had substantial legal liability for their own actions. What could they do?
They blamed the messenger: Russia.
It helps that Putin really is a pretty ruthless guy (see Thought #1) and that he probably did just win the Intel Lottery (Thought #3). Putin's success - again, on a shoestring - just had to frost our Obama-appointed Intel chiefs with their massive budgets, masters-of-the-Universe egos, and huge, high-tech systems.
But forgotten in all the hubbub was the core truth: HRC herself had just successfully rigged a US election. What's more, she got a pass - from the media, from the government, from the courts, and everyone except for a few lone voices on the left who were Bernie supporters.
All in all, the Intel-agency-generated-hubbub that successfully drowned out HRC's actual crime was very well-executed - something that Putin probably appreciates, at least from a professional standpoint.
If I hadn't witnessed this whole thing in real time, I never would have believed just how effective the Mighty Wurlitzer is in manufacturing consent. Just think. The left has been pro-dialog with the Soviet Union, and with Russia, for a long time now. The agencies along with the captive media had to get everyone on the left to do a 180, and then propel them into an attack. And, holy crap, it really worked!
As MM has said, Doug himself is a wonderful barometer of how a smart guy can be directed by the Wurlitzer into the desired thought channel. I have a fair number of friends who are also brand-new Russia-haters, without quite realizing how they got there.
I have an ongoing sense of wonder about the whole thing.
It makes me a believer in CAF's "entrainment technology" thesis.

Keep in mind which parts are assumption and could be wrong

"It is not what you don't know that gets you in trouble. It is what you know for sure that ain't so." -- Mark Twain.

"The first question is: Is that True?"
"The second question: Am I absolutely sure that it is true?--Byron Katie, on doing The Work

First of all, I think that DaveF's piece above is a fantastic synthesis of lots of information. And I appreciate how well he writes and ties things together in interesting ways.
But a couple of points don't seem necessarily "right" to me.
I think that it is very important to always keep in mind how much and how strong the supporting evidence is that lies behind each part of each impressions. (In my internal dialog I phrase this as "I feel 15% sure that this is true.")
So through that lens I want to point out 5 elements of Dave's assessment that rely on impressions.
------------------------------

Thought 1:Putin is KGB, he was, and always will be. He more or less destroyed Chechnya in the Second Chechen War, and my sense is, he is a fairly ruthless man - which apparently is just what Russia seems to like as a leader. As with anyone who has an intelligence agency background (Clapper, Brennan, Strzok, GHWB, etc), he is not to be trusted. He will pretty much do anything if he thinks he can get away with it.

So the beliefs here are that
Putin was, and always will be, KGB,
ruthless,
intelligence background, so will lie if he can get away with it.

So this might be true. But don't consider this impression a given.
---------------------------

Thought 2:
We don't have to trust Putin in order to engage in a dialog. Dialog, as the Democrats said back in the 1980s, was better than war with the then-Soviet Union. ...

I so agree with this.
---------------------------------

Thought 3:Russians have been meddling in the US since forever. What happened in 2016 is nothing new. Why all the fuss now? Because - assuming he did it - in 2016, Putin won the Intel Op lottery. He found a really critical truth that HRC was desperate to hide: namely, that she had just rigged the primary, with the collusion/cooperation of the US government and/or US intelligence agencies. And then he exposed this truth for everyone to see. There is nothing more deadly than revealing the truth. Nothing.

So 2 assumptions:
A. Russians have been meddling in the US since forever. Is this true? How sure are you? Meddling in the sense that when the Wisconsin Cheese Maker's Association donated to a French presidential candidate who promised to reduce import tarrifs (that might increase Wisconsin cheese sales into France) this would be called "America meddling in a French election?" Or do you mean covert operations?
B. Putin won the Intel Op lottery. Again, the underlying assumption expressed here is just what the Manhattan Elites / New York Aristocracy are trying to convince everyone of: That PUTIN himself is behind the DNC email leak. I very, very much question this assumption. I have seen NOTHING that even links Putin to the email leak in the slightest. Have I missed something?
--------------------------------------

Item 4:"He" found a really critical truth that HRC was desperate to hide: namely, that she had just rigged the primary, with the collusion/cooperation of the US government and/or US intelligence agencies. And then he exposed this truth for everyone to see. There is nothing more deadly than revealing the truth. Nothing.

So again, if the referral to "He" (meaning Putin) is removed, then I 100% agree. The "Oh Look Over There at Russia!" was a splendidly effective sleight of hand to turn the public attention away from demonstrated meddling in the democratic primary election (by HRC, not Russian) and the conspicuous corruption of the Clinton Foundation donation system for bribery.
But if the "He" is left in, then I doubt the statement.
I have not seenanyevidence or indicators that Putin was anywhere even remotely near the email leak from HRC/Podesta/Brazil and the gang. If anyone has any, I would like to hear it.
---------------------------------------

Item 5:
The (Obama-appointed) leadership of those three US intel agencies (CIA, NSA, FBI) were quite upset by the defeat of HRC, as their chance at continued employment within the government were basically zero. They were also exposed - as they had substantial legal liability for their own actions. What could they do?

So the assumption here is that the Intel agency leadership's motivation was acting to protect their own personal interests, employment, reputation, jail time for treason..... Might or might not be true.
What I find more likely is that the intelligence agency leaders represent the tip of the spear of the deep state. The same deep state that can have people assassinated, pardoned, "lose" evidence needed to charge and convict, reassign venues to their judges, etc. etc.
My impression here is that Russia-gate is the operation of the "Manhattan Elites," (Pepe Escobar's term) the Deep State. This is the same organized faction that can stage false flag terrorist operations against our own population, and can overthrough foreign regimes, and can ensure that some lines of thinking never see the light of day in the newsmedia, as they are the owners of that media.
Correct me if I am wrong: But so far I have not seen anything at all that points towards Russia or Putin in the DNC email hack.

leaks, hacks and Putin

SP-
I would encourage you to read some history on what happened in the Second Chechen War. Putin is exactly who he needs to be in Russia. That doesn't mean we can't do a deal with him - we do deals with people like Putin all the live-long day. If we have a meeting of mutual interests, it will all work out great.
But he's not a "nice man." That's what the evidence tells me. Honestly, I don't think he *could* be a nice man and survive at the top as long as he has in Russia.
We had dialog with the Politburo, we can have dialog with Putin. He doesn't need to be a nice man for us to dialog with him. We can sign a disarmament treaty with a strong verification regime, and everyone can go home happy. Of course, the newly-uber-hawkish left will probably scream "treason" - the magnitude of that about-face still wraps me around an axle every time I think about it - so I think it probably won't happen. Its the same thing the Republicans used to say whenever the Democrats tried to do disarmament 30-40 years ago. Its just so bizarre for me to see the left off in the weeds like this. Entrainment again. It really is like magic.
Now then, regarding the hack vs the leak.
There were two events that occurred - they have been conflated. There was the hack of Podesta's email account (a spearphishing attack) and there was the exfiltration of the DNC emails - and many other files too - for which we have forensic evidence that tells us it was a leak, not a hack. Podesta was just a gmail account that got broken into (which certainly could have been a Russian hacker), and the DNC leak, I believe, was Seth Rich. Who got whacked shortly after the exfiltration occurred.
So Podesta could easily have been Putin. And when Putin said "I didn't hack the DNC", he could be completely correct - ignoring the hack on Podesta. Which was a total goldmine. Man those emails were fascinating. He probably also got the contents of HRC's email server too - along with 5 other governments, and who knows who else. He'd have been derelict in his duty to NOT scarf up her emails.
As for Russia meddling in US elections, of course they do. As do we, literally everywhere - with a much, much larger budget, and substantially higher lethality. Think about it for a moment. If you were Putin, and you were faced with the possibility that Warmonger Hillary was going to get into power, after which she was going to use your country for target practice "just because" (I.e. to keep money flowing to the intel gang and NATO), would you stage an op or three to try and derail that train? Damn right you would.
This is the guy who destroyed Chechnya. He wouldn't hesitate to get a few hackers to poke around and see what might come up.
Do they have twitter bots? I'm sure they do. Did they spend $500k on facebook ad buys? I'm sure they did. This is all chump change. I mean, its really laughable just how little money they spent. It cost us many times more to investigate what they did than they spent on their ops. And it almost certainly tweaks the tail of the Big Bad NSA that one (Podesta) gmail account, hacked, caused all that trouble.
I'm just being pragmatic here. Russians will always be Russians. Doesn't mean we can't do a deal.
Anyhow. Leak vs hack, Podesta != DNC.
Last bit. These guys love power. If we assume there is a "deep state" of some sort, the leadership (Clapper, Brennan, Comey, Mueller) really do enjoy pulling the levers. And they appoint like-minded people to be their subordinates. This top, and second-from-the-top layer saw HRC as a way to keep pulling the levers, to remain in power. I'm guessing there was a quid pro quo - support HRC and her efforts, and you get to continue in your slot. And that's why HRC was sure she was going to win. The "fix" really was in, because the top two layers were completely behind her. And that's why her loss was so surprising to her.
It explains why Comey didn't toast HRC when he had every right to do so for her colossal blunder with the server. He wanted to stay in his slot, and she was going to let him. But the rank & file at FBI were probably utterly outraged at what she did, and so he couldn't just let her walk away free.
Of course that is all just speculation, but it sure does fit.

Take two aspirin

davefairtex wrote:

There were two events that occurred - they have been conflated. There was the hack of Podesta's email account (a spearphishing attack) and there was the exfiltration of the DNC emails - and many other files too - for which we have forensic evidence that tells us it was a leak, not a hack. Podesta was just a gmail account that got broken into (which certainly could have been a Russian hacker), and the DNC leak, I believe, was Seth Rich. Who got whacked shortly after the exfiltration occurred.

This sums it up nicely, but still deserves a few additional comments. It seems likely that Podesta was so stupid as to hand over his passwords. From that point onward, it is possible that Russian fingerprints are all over the bounty that they scooped up. These might have been found by our intelligence operatives, who then assumed that the same people were involved in the DNC leak. But given that the our intelligence folks have in times past bragged that they have the ability to provide false signatures to almost any electronically transmitted information, it also seems possible that whatever evidence we might have of Russian hacking might also be fake. Who ya gonna believe?

*redacted*

Meh, what's the point.
System is going to crash and burn to the ground. Right through at least 4 of the 5 stages of Orlov's collapse. Anyone paying attention to the weather patterns lately? (cue "Hot in Herre" by Nelly)
Can't even fathom the depth of hubris of those in power who think they can actually navigate this down successfully and still come out on top.
Hello little Thing. When do you start killing everyone? Oh, you're busy in Gaza at the moment.

disinformation

Then there's the latest string of 12 indictments of Russian intelligence officials that come after numerous other indictments and, as I recall, at least five plea deals, several of them Trump partisans.

Sure. Plea deals on "lying to the FBI", not on matters relating to "collusion with the Russians." And Mueller's indictments of dozens of Martians - excuse me, I mean Russians - who will, conveniently enough, never see the inside of a courtroom, so the evidence allegedly collected by Mueller on them will never be tested. And still no "collusion", whatever that is, after more than a year of looking for it.
And even if the charges on those Martians are legitimate - that they did hack Podesta - the worst we can say about them is that they revealed that...HRC rigged the primary. And that HRC's campaign had the press in their pockets. Which reporter was it that felt he needed to clear his stories through Podesta? Called himself a shill? And how about the bit where Chelsea was blabbing a bit too much about the inner workings of the Clinton Foundation - which apparently paid for her wedding? That was a good one too. No investigation on that one either.
The whole thing is a disinformation campaign to get us to look away from the cold hard truth that HRC rigged the Democratic primary. That's it. And if the investigation can pick up a few people for "lying to the FBI", so much the better. That way you can pretend you're actually doing something.
My takeaway from this effort:
1) make damn sure to file those FBARs
2) don't lie to the FBI.
To me, none of this is about "POTUS" and how much I allegedly love him. It's just about a masterpiece of disinformation - getting us to look away from some very real election rigging, for which we have mountains of evidence. Mountains, and mountains, and mountains of evidence, courtesy of Wikileaks. There are so many threads you could start pulling on in that pile of emails. Man, you could spend a lifetime...and I bet if you started really investigating those Clintons, bring up a few of their people on "lying to the FBI" charges, they'd start singing...use the same techniques as Mueller did...
But I suspect there are way too many people, currently still in power, who would end up with their necks on the chopping block if a real investigation were to happen - on both sides of the aisle. Too many people have looked away, or hidden things, or ignored things, etc. It might take the whole city down.
Heck, a thorough investigation by an honest investigator might even call into question the legitimacy of democracy in the US. Which, given all the data I've seen, is on pretty rocky ground. What's the re-election rate for all those weasels in Congress? "When your approval ratings are at their lowest, ever, and your re-election rates are at their highest, you'll know you've done your job well."
And that might be the whole - bipartisan - impetus behind keeping Mueller in place.

Political Theatre

Logic tells me that it’s a good thing to have the Presidents of the two most nuclear prolific countries talking. The rest of the finger pointing, chest thumping, teeth nashing and hand wringing is just political theatre. Much like a three ring circus we are all so busy watching the acts center stage we are missing the back story. And what’s that story?
The broken financial system
The stifling inflation imposed on us - even the 2nd hand & Goodwill have become expensive
The approaching energy challenges
The continued loss of jobs - still continuing here in Alaska
Extreme weather challenges - anyone notice the increase in volcanic activity?
Decrease in civility, respect & morals - our role models are lacking
Increase in crime
Major loss of community, privacy, liberty and family cohesiveness
Environmental changes - officials have decreased fishing up here this summer, hmm wonder why the numbers are lower?

But hey the assholes who are center stage haven’t noticed, they are in the spotlight and think they are in the know. Their “OMG” moment will come.
My 2 cents.
AKGrannyWGrit

Kudos DaveF

You laid it all out very well in your above comment. The hysteria now on display is realyl leaving me shaking my head, and a bit more worried than usual.
Frankly, I've lost a lot of respect for the individuals and organizations that have uncritically ingested the anti-Russia narrative.
Craig Murray lays it all out very well too:Emphasis is mine:

The entire “liberal” media and political establishment of the Western world reveals its militarist, authoritarian soul today with the screaming and hysterical attacks on the very prospect of detente with Russia. Peace apparently is a terrible thing; a renewed arms race, with quite literally trillions of dollars pumped into the military industrial complex and hundreds of thousands dying in proxy wars, is apparently the “liberal” stance.
Political memories are short, but just 15 years after Iraq was destroyed and the chain reaction sent most of the Arab world back to the dark ages, it is now “treason” to question the word of the Western intelligence agencies, which deliberately and knowingly produced a fabric of lies on Iraqi WMD to justify that destruction.
It would be more rational for it to be treason for leaders to blindly accept the word of the intelligence services.This is especially true on “Russia hacking the election” when, after three years of crazed accusations and millions of man hours by lawyers and CIA and FBI investigators, they are yet to produce any substantive evidence of accusations which are plainly nuts in the first place. This ridiculous circus has found a few facebook ads and indicted one Russian for every 100,000 man hours worked, forunspecified or minor actions which had no possible bearing on the election result.There are in fact genuine acts of election rigging to investigate. In particular, the multiple actions of the DNC and Democratic Party establishment to rig the Primary against Bernie Sanders do have some very real documentary evidence to substantiate them, and that evidence is even public.Yet those real acts of election rigging are ignored and instead the huge investigation is focused on catching those who revealed Hillary’s election rigging. This gets even more absurd – the investigation then quite deliberately does not focus on catching whoever leaked Hillary’s election rigging, but instead seeks to prove that the Russians hacked Hillary’s election-rigging, which I can assure you they did not. Meanwhile, those of us who might help them with the truth if they were actually interested, are not questioned at all.
The Russophobic witch hunt has its first real life victim in 29-year-old Maria Butina, whose life is to be destroyed for chatting up members of the NRA in order to increase Russian influence. With over 20 years of diplomatic experience, I can tell you that every country, including the UK and US, has bit part players of its own nationals who self-start in a country to make their way, and if they gain any traction are tapped by their national security service as potential “agents of influence”. I could name quite literally scores of such people, but have no desire to get anyone in trouble. The elevation of Butina into a huge threat and part of a gigantic plot, is to ignore the way the United States and the United Kingdom and indeed all major governments’ Embassies behave around the globe.The war-hawks who were devastated by the loss of champion killer Hillary now see the prospect of their very worst fear coming true. Their very worst fear is the outbreak of peace and international treaties of arms control. Hence the media and political establishment today has reached peaks of hysteria never before seen. Pursuing peace is “treason” and the faux left now stand starkly exposed.
(Source)

My personal stance very much aligns with what Craig has written.
I’ve been continually dumbfounded that the democrats whose to go full-in on chasing “who” might have revealed their inner corruption rather than focusing on “what” was revealed.
To my mind, who revealed the vast inner corruption and collusion of the DNC is merely an interesting footnote to an otherwise explosive story. The main investigation really ought to have been centered on the substance of what was revealed.
Well, in a functioning democracy, I mean.
So I find it rather unappealing that so many are literally screaming about this “attack on our democracy” when there’s really no functioning democracy left to preserve if the “what” is accurate (and I believe it is).
Now that some are taking the next round of neocon talking points and calling Russia’s possible electronic infiltration efforts “an act of war” and even “a modern Pearl Harbor” I’m pretty much flabbergasted nearly to the point of not knowing how to begin picking apart the insanity.
The collective amnesia and utter ignorance on display about the US’s own role in the world of electronic shenanigans and foreign election meddling is extreme and unsettling.
Meanwhile, no Monarch butterflies are breeding locally this year (based on my survey of 1,000+ milkweed stalks), emerging markets continue to implode, the ECB continues top print, the natives are growing restless all over the globe, heat records have been shattered in the northern hemisphere in June, and Tony Seba’s vision of 100% electric, autonomous vehicles by 2030 is now a year in the rear-view mirror without any sign of coming true even as the true state of future oil supply issues is crawling into the global consciousness.
So I am mightily impressed by the ability of the Mighty Wurlitzer to so comprehensively play on people’s emotional centers while shutting down their critical thinking (and memory recall) functions.

A special reminder

As a cautionary tale, I am posting this picture of Douglas Feith. He was Undersecretary for Defense Policy in 2001 and is credited, along with Richard Perle, with being the source of the "Iraq has WMDs" and "Saddam has close ties to Al Qaada" deceptions. He worked in the Office of Special Plans at the Pentagon. Years later, when the dust settled and over 1 million dead were buried, it turns out both were lies. Be careful when honest looking men in suits try to stir up wars!

Glad they talked

I had a relative accuse me of supporting the enemy because I believed it was the responsible thing to do for leaders of nuclear armed nations to meet face to face and discuss issues. The enemy was a country that this relative always favored when they were a legitimate communist totaltitarian country. Now not so much, so they are the new enemy. I spent many many long cold nights watching the fenceline guarding against the enemy. In my opinion the worm has surely turned.